Eurozone leaders completed a mammoth 17-hour meeting this morning and announced they had unanimously agreed to offer a third bailout worth €86bn to Greece in return for the debt-ridden country immediately bringing in a swathe of reforms to cut spending on pensions, raise tax revenues and liberalise the labour market.

But Ms Lucas said the new measures, which must be pushed through the Greek parliament by Wednesday, would cripple the country and said the democratic will of a country had been “superseded” by the forces of the EU, International Monetary Fund and European Central Bank.

Writing on her website, Ms Lucas said: “The oldest democracy in the world has been subjected to a coup. Over the course of just a few days the Greek Parliament is being forced to rush through emergency legislation to cut pensions, raise taxes and privatise swathes of the economy – without any time for genuine debate. The forces of darkness – the IMF, the Eurozone and the ECB – are subjecting an already deeply impoverished country to further needless cruelty. National sovereignty has, in effect, been suspended.

“A credible solution to Greece’s woes exists: European countries should come together to discuss ways to cancel at least some of the debt. It’s been done before – when Germany’s debts were cancelled after World War Two – and it should be done again.

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